Russell Abrams is an American hedge fund manager and entrepreneur who is the founder of Russellcar, a taxi cab rent-to-own company in Buenos Aires.[1]

Career

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Wall Street

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Abrams started a career on Wall Street working at Goldman Sachs Asset Management developing quantitative models and doing research for Fischer Black, co-developer of the Black–Scholes options pricing model.[1] Between 1997 and 2000, Abrams was the co-head of Equity Derivatives and Convertible Arbitrage at Merrill Lynch.[2] In 2001, Abrams founded Titan Capital Group,[3][4][5] which was one of the first volatility arbitrage funds[6][7] and at its height had over $1 billion AUM.[8] Titan funds were included in the Wall Street Journal's list of "The Hedge Fund 100" in 2009[9] and 2010,[citation needed] and won Hedgeweek's award for Best Relative Fund Manager in 2012.[6]

Russellcar

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While at Titan, Abrams made strategic investments in Argentina, which led to Abrams and his wife, Sandra Piedrabuena, founding Russellcar.[10] Abrams has pledged to spend over $100 million on sustainable-only vehicles.[11][12] The company offers credit to women in order to help them rent-to-own taxis.

Other work

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Abrams helped fund an endowment for the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award.[13]

References

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  1. ^ a b Russo, Camila (28 July 2014). "Former Goldman Options Trader Becomes Argentina Taxi King". Bloomberg.
  2. ^ "Titan Capital Group – Best Relative Value Fund Manager". Hedgeweek. 7 December 2012.
  3. ^ "Titan Capital Group". titancapital.net. Archived from the original on 2017-01-09. Retrieved 2017-01-07.
  4. ^ "Russell Abrams: Executive Profile & Biography – Bloomberg". www.bloomberg.com. Retrieved 2017-01-16.
  5. ^ Cited in Hedge Fund News, May 2003, Issue 37 as "focusing on trading while two other partners take care of the business side"
  6. ^ a b "Titan Capital Group – Best Relative Value Fund Manager". HedgeWeek.com. 12 July 2012. Retrieved 21 January 2018.
  7. ^ Hedge Fund News, May 2003, Issue 37: What is volatility arbitrage?
  8. ^ See 2008 Numbers: http://www.technologyinvestor.com/?p=3644
  9. ^ "The Hedge Fund 100" (PDF). The Wall Street Journal.
  10. ^ Rowley, Melissa Jun. "How This Entrepreneur Is Countering Sexual Assault in Argentina One Taxi Ride At A Time". Forbes. Retrieved 2018-03-08.
  11. ^ Chu, Ben (28 July 2014). "Trader takes punt on taxis in Argentina". independent.co.uk. Retrieved 2017-01-14. In the 1990s he researched derivative strategies at the US investment bank, before founding the hedge fund Titan Capital Group in 2011.
  12. ^ "Betting $100M on Buenos Aires Taxi Medallions". Bloomberg.
  13. ^ "Young Lions Fiction Award". New York Public Library.